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Great, but short afternoon on the water! After serving this morning we headed out to Lk Grapevine to meet up with our captain & admiral, Tim & Diann aboard s/v Coquette. It was the kick-off of the summer race series but was called due to thunderstorms as we were tacking up to the start line. Ah, well ... another race in a couple weeks :o)
We woke up to our last morning aboard Thalia today and with heavy hearts we dingied ashore to return to land life. What a treat it has been to share this experience and we are so grateful to Lisa & Kirk for their generous hospitality, enlightening conversation & patience with our endless questions about their incredible lifestyle.
Spent the afternoon in D.C. walking the National Mall & Memorial Parks.
Meandered through the Smithsonian & caught a 3-D IMAX show
At just about the farthest walking point from where we parked, we got caught in a pretty rough thunderstorm. With a mix of running, walking to catch our breath, & laughing at the ridiculousness of it all - we returned to the car soaked like wet puppy dogs. Changed clothes, stopped for dinner, headed to the airport & slept like babies the entire flight home.
We spent the day exploring the "sailboat capital of the world", downtown Annapolis with Kirk and Lisa. We strolled through the local shops, made our way past "Ego Alley" and they treated us to lunch at McGarvey's along the city dock. We lounged on deck this evening with a stack of "TravelTopics" questions, learned more about each other, enjoyed the conversation and read as the sun set.
Another glorious day of sailing The Chesapeake Bay! We have so much respect and appreciation for Kirk and Lisa "showing us the ropes" (pun intended).
We woke up with daylight, shared morning greetings and breakfast, and even borrowed the dingy to row over to a little island we could see across the way. We spent the rest of the day learning, asking a zillion questions, and listening with intent to our Captain and Admiral :o)
Tonight, we anchored up in the Chester River. We took this pic of the moon looking up through the windows of our state room. A day and eve well spent!
An amazing beginning to our sailing excursion of the Chesapeake Bay! We started the day with a fun breakfast at Chick & Ruth's Delly in downtown Annapolis before meeting up with Lisa & Kirk at Weems Creek. We dingied out to tour the beautiful "Thalia" and put away our small amount of gear.
We then all dingied back to shore & headed into town for lunch & to Trader Joe's to stock up on "provisions". Once we returned to the boat & settled in, we set the sails & headed out past Thomas Point lighthouse toward our first night's anchoring near near High Island up the Hrode River.
It's a great day for celebrating! Today is Matt's birthday and when asked how he'd like to spend it, I wasn't surprised when we headed to the water. We met up with Tim and Diane to sail on their incredible, Coquette, at the Catalina 22 National Regatta Championship on Lake Grapevine.
We had a great day out on the waters of Lake Lewisville for our last on-the-water lesson with Hobie University. Hobie Fleet 23 sponsors an exceptional sailing course with Sam Baker sharing his invaluable experience and coaching. We even took Sam's Hobie out for a great run and I'm already itching to return to the water. We wrapped up the day with a double-feature (Forgetting Sarah Marshall & Horton Hears a Who) at the Drive-In theatre in Ennis!
Matt and I ventured out a little to check out a place to have dinner-with-a-lake-view along Lake Ray Hubbard. I'll admit, the first place we stopped was a good try but despite our best efforts in Rockwall, Texas, we just couldn't do it ;o). I was challenged to not give up so we drove a little further and stumbled into a great little area with a cute lighthouse and a fun little cajun restaurant, Dodies. I loved the character on the menu that called out "Uppity Food" ... a mere 30 miles from The Big D and crab legs are considered a snobby choice ;o).
We officially started sailing lessons today! Mariner Sails of Dallas offers a great, complimentary sailing course consisting of five sessions - three 2-hour evening lecture sessions held at Mariner Sails and two on-the-water sessions held out at Hobie Point on Lake Lewisville).
My parents treated us to a sunset sailing charter out of Galveston Bay today! Mom, Dad, my cutie brother Casey and his girlfriend, Meagan, Matt and I sailed out for an incredible cruise with beautiful sunset and bright orange full moon. Captain Jim earned his money's worth with Matt's sailing questions as he eventually took over the helm for our cruise :o).
Beautifully sunny (76°) in the Big D today. We managed through a few tense moments on our sailor's second trek on White Rock Lake (let's just say the sails were briefly in the water and the little craft had more water in the cockpit than we'd like - matched with an overweighted trailor's suspention failure as we were pulling out). The afternoon was recovered with "Huck Finn's" quick thinking and resourceful MacGyver moves. We spent a more relaxing evening with a cool-breezed bike ride down Katy Trail for a little Paciugo at Victory Park.
Matt successfully set sail today on White Rock Lake! Beautiful day of excitement, nerves, and tenacity.
